The invention relates to training systems used to train and analyze the performance of shooters and in particular to a firearm training system which measures and displays appropriately as a function of time, a pattern of grip pressure applied to the firearm by the weapon hand of the shooter.
The equipment used in the training of shooting methods and skills has been traditionally limited to silhouette targets positioned on a supervised shooting range. With such equipment, the assessment of a shooter's competence in basic shooting technique is limited to an examination of the shot groupings on the target relative to the intended point of aim. Improper stance or posture, incorrect aim or "slight picture", improper grip of the firearm, blinking, waver, jerking or flinching due to anticipation of the recoil and loud report of the shot are among the many common problems which lead to shooting inaccuracy or inconsistency.
Proper technique in the basic fundamentals of shooting technique such as visual aim, stance and breathing have proven to be relatively easy for instructors to convey to the shooter, due to their simple nature. The common experience of firearms instructors, however, is that of these various possible problems in individual shooting technique, the most difficult to clearly identify, convey to the shooter and then correct are those problems relating to the gripping of the gun and the manipulation of the trigger, as specifically discussed in two publications respectively entitled "Reasonable and Necessary", (David W. Young, 1991, REASONABLE AND NECESSARY, Defensive Firearms Ownership and use in Canada, RN, Roxboro, Quebec, Canada) and "The Modern Technique of The Pistol", (G. B. Morrison, 1991, Gunsite Press, Paulden, Ariz.). Proper exertion of grip and correct trigger movement are relatively complex and unfamiliar physical motor skill actions for shooters to learn, and are accordingly difficult to master. Young states that the trigger must be moved smoothly and consciously to the rear in one motion, without any sympathetic movement of the other fingers. However, learning shooters have the tendency to either unconsciously increase their grip force simultaneously with advancing trigger position, due to the inability to separate the index or trigger finger's action from that of the other fingers, or increase either the trigger pull rate, or the front-to-back grip force in isolation, as Morrison also points out. However, these errors are, due to the subtle nature of the movements involved, difficult or even impossible to visually detect. As a result, instructors are typically forced to resort to costly trial-and-error methods involving repetitive live fire coupled with close one-on-one observation and further "target-reading" by the instructor in order to deduce with more certainty or precision the error in technique being committed; costly additional instructor time and ammunition is inevitably consumed in the course of this approach. Thus, an apparatus is desired which would provide direct, objective and unambiguous feedback as to the shooter's actual performance in the key shooting fundamentals of grip and trigger manipulation.
When grip force is discussed in Morrison as a potential cause of a shooting problem, it is always a specific direction or component of grip pressure which is being referred to rather than just front-to-back or an average overall grip force. For example, if shots in target practice land to the right side of the target area ("3 O'Clock" shooting) excessive support-hand grip pressure, which would appear solely as a left-grip side force in the case of a right-handed shooter, or as a right-side force in the case of a left-handed shooter, is a possible cause. Thus, it is submitted that shooting problem could only be effectively diagnosed if one is equipped with feedback on both front-to-back as well as side-to-side grip forces, throughout the cycle of the shot. On the other hand, trigger pull problems, for example "mashing" or failure to pull the trigger at the proper rate in a controlled manner are also mentioned as possible causes for shooting inaccuracy either in isolation or in combination with improper grip. Furthermore, "flinch" manifests itself as a jerking action in the hands either in just the grip fingers, or in both the grip and the trigger fingers. Thus, feedback on both grip force and trigger motion is preferable for a more effective diagnosis of shooting problems.
Consequently, a means was therefore desired which would provide shooters and instructors with proper feedback on the grip pattern, i.e. the front-to-back grip forces of the shooter's weapon hand and preferably also trigger pull. Thus, a means was sought which would detect the grip force pattern and preferably the trigger position and display them for visual feedback. This feedback would also be stored to permit later analysis and comparison of individual shooter performance against already stored feedback of previous personal performance, or against known well executed performance by others, so as to provide a clear and highly visually relevant objective for the shooter. These goals should preferably be accomplished under live fire conditions as well as dry-fire conditions, given that some of the common problems mentioned above arise only when the shooter is in anticipation of the loud report and violent recoil of the firearm. In other words, a firearm training system was desired which would permit assessment of a shooter's grip and preferably trigger pull versus time.
Witzig, in his German patent application published Dec. 9, 1976 (DT 2,523,362) teaches an electronic shooting simulator for target and shooting practice with weapons adapted to fire live ammunition. The simulator provides for the detection of especially arm waver and jerk during firing of the weapon. To this end, the simulator includes a receiver shell, which has electronics for detecting a beam of radiation emitted by the target and is placed into the barrel of a regular hand gun or rifle. Thus, the shooting simulator may only be used under "dry-fire" conditions. The beam emitted by the target may only be detected by the receiver shell when the weapon is correctly aimed at the target so that the beam may travel along the barrel of the weapon and impinge onto the forward end of the receiver shell. Although this simulator provides for the detection of problems such as arm waver and jerk, no further resolution or pinpointing of specific errors in basic technique is achieved which would allow the shooter to independently and reliably identify specific wrong movements or errors in basic technique without significant instructor involvement or intervention. No means is taught for the displaying or recording of trigger position or grip force components versus time.
British patent GB 2,013,844 to Knight teaches a training equipment facilitating the training of a marksman. The equipment includes a weapon such as a gun or rifle with pressure transducers mounted on the weapon to detect the pressure applied by the marksman to the butt, the cheek and the hand grips of the gun. A representation of the weapon is shown on a visual display unit and those parts of the representation which correspond to the parts of the weapon that are provided with pressure transducers may be illuminated with different colors representing different levels of applied pressure. The display may constantly indicate the actual pressure applied to the weapon by different colors or may only display the pressure applied at the time of firing, after firing or while firing a burst of shots. However, the training system only provides a visual display of an actual momentary pressure or the difference between the actual momentary pressure and an optimum pressure stored by a computer driving the system. Thus, this system, while providing a momentary display of hand grip forces, does not provide for a display of grip forces throughout the cycle of the shot. Further, the system of Knight renders the detection of variations in hand grip forces during firing, which occupy very short time intervals and which may significantly affect shot accuracy, virtually impossible even for an instructor or observer to detect, let alone the shooter who is presumably visually busy aiming at the time of firing. Furthermore, the system provides no measurement or display of the trigger position versus time along with a display of grip forces, nor any other means of time-wise correlation between these so as to allow more precise isolation of problems in basic shooting technique. Rather, only a means of determining whether or not the trigger is advanced beyond a specific point in its overall travel range is mentioned.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,970,819 to Mayhak describes a firearm safety system, which prevents the firing of a firearm unless the hand grip of the firearm is held with a certain predetermined grip pattern. Mayhak describes in particular a safety system for a revolver, which is equipped in its hand grip with pressure transducers, a grip pattern recognition neural network memory, a microprocessor, a solenoid activated trigger lock and a battery power supply. Thus, Mayhak teaches the use of pressure transducers in the hand grip of a revolver for the sensing of the hand grip pattern of a user. However, no display of the hand grip force levels or of trigger position against time, nor any means of storing for analysis or correlating these two sets of information to deduce and convey to the user errors in shooting technique, are provided.
U.S. Pat. No. 1,494,407 to Beach describes the design of a model of a handgun which is specially equipped so as to offer variance, for practice purposes, of the physical resistance on the frontal area of the grip handle and of the trigger. This design, while of some value in familiarizing the shooter with differing trigger pull loads and in developing, as claimed, increased finger and grip strength, does not teach any visual display or recording whatsoever of grip force components or trigger position versus time so as to permit any assessment or analysis of technique in grip or trigger manipulation. Further, the design described is not seen as intended for, or in any acceptable way applicable to, an operational firearm.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,913,655 to Pinkley et al describes a device for measuring and improving trigger pull technique. This device involves installation inside the handle area of the handgun of a variable slide resistor to convert trigger position to an electrical signal which can then be visually represented on a chart recorder. While this system provides a means of measuring and recording the smoothness and rate of trigger pull, the design requires an internal mechanical installation of the handgun which would, due to the use of the internal space of the handle for the cartridge magazine on all modern pistols, and the inaccessible nature of the trigger mechanism on many guns, not be applicable to an operational handgun for live fire for many of the handgun designs now predominantly used in North America. This design also does not teach or suggest any measurement, recording or display of grip forces, limiting its value for the specific diagnosis of many errors in fundamental technique by the user. Lack of suitability of this design for live fire would suggest that the various errors in technique typically arising only when live fire scenarios are involved could not be exposed by the disclosed design.
Thus, none of these prior art systems provides a satisfactory solution for the detection and display of unwanted variations in the hand grip forces of the weapon hand and for the detection of uneven trigger pull, which may both lead to shooting inaccuracy.